Cale jumped forward and put his boot into Azriim's back. The slaad hissed in pain and collapsed onto his belly.
You would not kill me in these clothes, would you? Azriim asked, and Cale almost laughed at the absurdity of the question.
Cale saw the wounds he had inflicted with Weaveshear beginning to close. The slaad's leathery skin was sealing itself. Soon, Azriim would have the use of his legs again. The creatures regenerated quickly, perhaps more quickly than Cale himself. He knew then that he would have to finish Azriim with brutal, overwhelming, final violence.
Cale hesitated for a moment, wondering if he should spare Azriim, force him to tell all he knew of the Sojourner.
No, Cale decided. He would learn what he needed to know some other way. Azriim had to die. At that moment, chororin required it.
He raised Weaveshear high for a decapitating strike.
"This is over," he said, and was pleased to hear that his voice was his own and not Riven's.
Azriim turned to face him, turned to face death. His mismatched eyes did not show fear, but they did go wide.
By the time Cale realized that Azriim's eyes were wide from surprise, not fear, it was too late.
Agonizing pain exploded in Cale's back. Magical steel pierced his flesh, his kidneys, and scraped against his ribs and spine. He looked down to see the tips of two blades making little tents of his cloak before poking through. Two saber tips.
Riven's sabers.
Warm blood poured down Cale's back, and trickled down his front. Sparks exploded in his brain. His vision went blurry, but somehow he managed to keep his feet. Riven pulled both blades free. Cale hissed at the shot of agony that ran through his frame as the blades withdrew. He tried to turn around but his body would not respond. It was all he could do to stay upright. He clutched Weaveshear hard in his fist but felt it slipping from his grasp.
"It's over, Cale," Riven said, his voice as frigid as a winter gale. "It's over."
A saber stab again impaled Cale's organs. Another. He could not even groan. The strength went out of his legs. He collapsed to the floor, and the fall seemed to take forever. His hearing went dull. Sounds seemed to stretch impossibly long, into a scale he'd never before noticed. Only the rasping of his breath and the irregular hammering of his heart sounded clearly and normally in his ears.
Cale lay on his side, his eyes open, his breathing labored. He felt his shade flesh struggling to regenerate, but feared it would fail. Riven had done a lot of damage. Like Cale, the one-eyed assassin knew how to kill. And the assassin knew how to betray.
In some distant part of his brain, Cale wondered when Riven had made the decision to turn on them, wondered whether the assassin had planned it all along. For a reason he could not explain, Cale thought of the Plane of Shadow. He cursed himself for a fool, a trusting fool. In his mind, he could hear Azriim laughing.
Riven walked past him, past the prone slaad, and retrieved the silver seed. Sabers still bare and bloody, he walked back to stand over the slaad. Two saber tips pointed at Azriim's heart.
"My mind is open," Riven said to the slaad. "Read it."
Azriim's mismatched eyes narrowed and Cale sensed the flow of mental energy. A fanged grin spread across the slaad's face.
"I come with you, and participate in what's to come," Riven simultaneously asked and ordered.
Azriim nodded. Riven sheathed a saber and extended a hand to help the slaad up. Azriim took it and climbed slowly to his feet. His regeneration had returned the use of his legs.
"Give me the seed," Azriim said.
Riven ignored him, and Cale could imagine but not see the assassin's sneer.
Still holding the seed, Riven turned to Cale. He knelt down on his haunches so that he and Cale could see into each other's faces. Riven's eye was cold, the hole in his other socket black and deep. Cale thought back to an alley in Selgaunt, when Riven had been helpless before him. He should have killed him then.
"I side with the winner, Cale," Riven said. "You don't see it, you never saw it, but you've already lost." He stood, spat a glob of saliva onto Cale's cheek, and added, "And I've been Second long enough."
Cale tried to grab his boot, failed, coughed up blood, but managed to groan, "You'll always ... be Second . . . to me, Zhent."
Riven stood still for a moment, and Cale waited for the finishing saber cut. It did not come, and when the assassin spoke, Cale could hear the sneer in his voice.
"It doesn't appear so now."
Together, Riven and Azriim walked to the huge crystal in the center of the room. They stood for a moment before the crystal and looked at the orange beam, the beam that powered the Skulls, that kept Skullport from collapsing.
Without ceremony, Riven handed the seed to Azriim. The slaad appeared startled by the gesture, but took the seed.
Azriim looked at Cale and said to Riven, "If he lives, he'll come looking for you."
Riven eyed Cale coldly and replied, "I hope he does."
"We need to get you some new clothes," Azriim said with a smile, then he slipped the seed into the beam.
The moment the silver seed touched the orange light, it disintegrated into a million glowing particles, all of them streaking upward like a swarm of fireflies, spreading along the net of power. The orange glow darkened, turned crimson. The air changed. Cale's ears popped. A low, vibratory hum sounded, growing louder and louder. The entirety of the chamber bucked, shook. The tower rattled. The huge crystal cracked and a million fine lines manifested along its facets.
Cale turned his head and saw that outside the cupola, stalactites detached from the ceiling, fell gracefully through the air, and crashed thunderously amongst the ruins. Clouds of dust went up from the point of impact. It was raining stone.
It was at that moment that Cale realized that the bleeding in his back had stopped. His flesh closed the wound. Though still weak, he reached into his cloak pocket and found his holy symbol. The feel of its soft velvet in his hand comforted him.
I'm the First, he thought. I'm the First.
He searched his mind for a spell, something to stop Riven and Azriim. He found one, tried to utter the words, but was unable to maintain his concentration. He could only watch them, could only bear witness to his failure.
Azriim, grinning like a lunatic, took out his teleportation rod. Riven grabbed the slaad by the arm.
"I'm coming with you," he said.
Still wearing that stupid grin, Azriim nodded and said, "I wouldn't have it any other way."
The slaad began to manipulate the rod.
From behind him, Cale heard a voice-Jak's voice-exclaim, "Riven! I knew it, you black-hearted whoreson!"
Azriim and Riven looked up in surprise.
Cale turned his head to see Jak and Magadon standing in the cupola's archway. Both looked to Cale. He tried to indicate to them that he was all right, that he would live, but managed only to blink at them.
Jak's mouth went hard.
"Bastard," he said to Riven.
As fast as a lightning strike, the halfling pulled two throwing daggers from his chest bandolier and whipped them across the chamber.
Cale heard one sink into flesh. Riven grunted, and Cale turned to see one of the blades buried to the hilt in the assassin's shoulder.
"I'd kill you for that, little man," Riven said, grimacing as he pulled the dagger free. "Except that you're already dead. And I'm leaving."
The assassin had something in his hand. He hurled it back at Jak. The halfling couldn't dodge it, and the small wooden object thumped into Jak's chest, doing no damage, and fell to the floor.
Jak's pipe.
"Be thankful it's not steel, Fleet," Riven growled.